


Bleed Effect

by devera



Category: Assassin's Creed
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-31
Updated: 2011-02-08
Packaged: 2017-10-15 12:10:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/160708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devera/pseuds/devera
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Desmond learns, whether he wants to or not.</p>
          </blockquote>





	1. Bleed Effect

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Desmond learns, whether he wants to or not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this originally came before Slight Miscalculation, but has languished on my livejournal pretty much since it was posted. In hindsight, there's not as much logic between how this part concludes and how the other part starts as I thought, but I don't feel like trying a rewrite. Feel free to consider them 2 separate stories if it bothers you too much.

_String of Italian falling from his lips, too fast, too broken for the Animus to translate. Sensation, straining. God, wanting. Hands on him and his breath thin in his chest, his heart pounding, his limbs spreading, trembling. A mouth, cock. Sin, its madness spreading hot like a wild fire through him. He begs, at the last, shamelessly, crying out gladly on each thrust, free as he's never been, and –_  
  
"Desmond? Desmond!"  
  
He gasped awake, a great lungful of breath, and reality crashed back with all the effect of a bucket of ice water.  
  
"Fuck," he swore, stunned almost beyond speech. "Fuck me."  
  
"Okay, Desmond?" Shaun asked, stepping back a little. He looked like he always looked – that was to say like a bit of an asshole, but for once, he seemed actually concerned. Desmond blinked past him, around the loft. No Lucy and no Rebecca.  
  
"Where is everybody?" he asked finally, groggily, trying to push himself up, unsteady and disorientated like he always was after a session. Shaun bent down and hooked a hand under his arm and to help him up, and then gave a reassuringly sour look when Desmond waved him off.  
  
"Yes, well, not _here_ , clearly," he said. He didn't need to add the 'moron'; that was, as usual, understood. "Lucy's out. Abstergo seem to be busy little bees at the moment and she's doing a little recon."  
  
"Right," Desmond agreed, trying hard, real hard, to think about Lucy, about where she was and what kind of trouble she was getting herself into, and not… and not what the Animus had just shown him. "And?"  
  
"And," Shaun continued grudgingly, "Rebecca's sourcing some parts on the black market. She tried to get you to come out of it early, but you seemed rather... _happy_ where you were."  
  
And that's when Desmond realised that not everything that happened in the Animus stayed in the Animus.  
  
"Oh, Jesus Christ," he said with a groan, and flopped back on the couch and threw an arm over his face, because seriously, bleeding effect fine, but this was just not fair.  
  
"Oh," Shaun said, and the bastard actually sounded like he thought it was _funny_. "I wouldn't worry _too_ much, Desmond. After all, we're both blokes, right?"  
  
Desmond kept his eyes shut and counted to five, because that really wasn't what he needed to hear at the moment. "Right," he replied in a strangled voice.  
  
"So." And now Shaun sounded downright gleeful. "Your ancestor then. I'm thinking…bit of a tart? How am I doing?"  
  
Desmond groaned again, and behind his arm, his face flamed.

"Fuck off, Shaun," he muttered, without any real hope that Shaun would. When he did, back over to his desk - and from the line of the bastard's shoulders Desmond knew he was still bloody well laughing at him – Desmond was surprised, but not enough to let the opportunity go to waste.

  
Shut in the bathroom and snatching up one of the hand towels, he had to stop for a second, because he was shaking a little and fuck. Jesus Christ. He'd just… Okay, he just had to calm the hell down. One, that wasn't him, no matter how much it had felt like – All right. Not going there. Two, he was not up to having some kind of identity crisis about this, not right now, not on top of the usual identity crisis he had when he let himself think about what it meant to be able to access someone else's memories like they were his own, what it was like to dream someone else's life.  
  
But when he leaned on the basin and stared at himself in the mirror, it was too much like being pushed over that desk. A young, reckless Florintine's memory was his own, and he couldn't not think about it, about Antionio's sly smile as he'd poured him glass after glass of wine, about his soft, undemanding touch, then his much more demanding mouth, and then skin, and clothing in disarray and –  
  
"Fuck me," Desmond said again, but the irony that he pretty much just had been definitely did not escape him.  
  
+++++++++  
  
"Wow. You logged a _ton_ of time in Pickpocket HQ last night, Desmond. Was something happening?"  
  
Desmond stared at Rebecca, and it was probably a good thing she was hunched down behind the terminal, because he had a feeling she'd only have to look at his face to get an answer. Probably that was the only way she _would_ get it. He'd tossed and turned all night, keeping himself awake trying not to think about it, which meant of course he'd thought about it – a lot – and he still had no idea what to think, let alone what to tell her.  
  
"Uh, I…"  
  
"I've already archived that session, Rebecca," Shaun said irritably from the other side of the room, without even bothering to look over. "There wasn't anything of note, mostly just that _fop_ Antonio going on and _on_ about his grand plans to improve Venice. I'm sure that's useful to Desmond in terms of his strategic planning skills, but otherwise it's just white noise. Of course, you go ahead and undo all my work. I don't mind at all. I love wasting my time on things that I am in fact not supposed to be doing."  
  
"Oh," Rebecca said, blinking. "Oh, well, sure. No problems, Shaun. Thanks a lot."

And suddenly Desmond didn't have to say anything at all. He was still trying to work out how that had happened when Shaun gave them a dismissive wave, still without looking, and said, "You're welcome."  
  
Staring at the back of his head, Desmond had a feeling he wasn't talking to Rebecca anymore.  
  
+++++++++  
  
The problem with learning stuff was that you couldn't _un_ learn it, not in the Animus. Desmond sat at the kitchen table and picked morosely at his breakfast. He supposed he should feel… violated or something. That was the problem: he _didn't_. Ezio had been... fucked. Desmond forced himself to look right at it, call it what it was. He'd been fucked by Antonio, and sure, he'd been drunk, a little, but Desmond was pretty sure he'd wanted it. He was absolutely sure he'd liked it, and what he'd felt, Desmond had felt; what Ezio learned, Desmond learned too.  
  
And what was he supposed to do with that? He wasn't- Well, until yesterday he'd never found a reason to even _wonder_ what it would feel like to have some guy's dick up his ass, and now he _knew_ and God damn it. Why the hell had that memory come up anyway? Exactly how did sex with Antonio fit into Templars and training and weird mind controlling objects? Why show him that? Maybe the Animus was broken or something. Not that that was a conversation he ever intended on having: _What makes you think the Animus is broken? Well, what does anal sex have to do with assassinations?_ Yep. Nope. Never having that conversation.  
  
Maybe it was just a one time thing. Maybe the Animus had just misjudged the importance of the memory. Or maybe it had been important, but only to Ezio. First time and everything. Desmond pushed his plate aside and leaned over, banged his forehead gently on the table top with a groan. His first time too. And he didn't even really like Antonio.  
  
"Well, good morning sunshine."  
  
Desmond sighed and rolled his head against the table to find Shaun standing by the sink with a croissant and a coffee, dressed in track pants and a singlet and looking disgustingly fresh and cheerful.  
  
"Shaun," Desmond said and willed the man to go away. Of course, he didn't.  
  
"Sleep well?" he asked instead, with a knowing grin and Desmond sat up again and slumped back in his chair.

"You're really enjoying this, aren't you?" he accused, and he didn't care that he sounded like a whiny kid.  
  
"Oh, come on Desmond," Shaun laughed. "So you got laid, mate. You should be happy."  
  
Desmond glared at him. "Yeah, well," he grouched. "Excuse me if I like to have a choice about who I get laid _with_. And have you stopped to consider for a second what… _that_ has to do with what I'm supposed to be doing in there?"  
  
Shaun watched him a moment, sipping at his coffee, and Desmond had no idea what he was thinking by the look on his face.  
  
"Well," he said after a moment, and came over to the table and pulled out a chair and sat down. "I guess no one's really explained it to you before. The Animus can only maintain a stable environment when you reach a certain level of synchronicity."  
  
Desmond nodded. He knew that. He'd lost targets and 'died' enough times to know what it felt like when the Animus dropped out of synch.  
  
"Right," Shaun nodded. "And significant events are necessary to increase the probability of that synchronicity between you and the memories."  
  
"Like when it stalls until I do something."  
  
"Those are just little glitches," Shaun dismissed. "But, essentially, yes. So…"  
  
Desmond frowned at him. "So," he finished reluctantly. "What happened last night was something the Animus thought I needed to know in order to stay synchronised."  
  
Shaun leaned over and clapped him on the arm and grinned. "That or you just got lucky, mate."  
  
"God," he sighed and ran a hand across his eyes. He was pretty sure he was developing a headache, and he hadn't even started his day. "What happens if it happens again?"  
  
"Desmond, you're flattering yourself if you think it's nothing Lucy and Bec have seen before."  
  
Desmond dropped his hand. "That's not the point, Shaun! Jesus Christ!"  
  
"Well, no need to worry about it right now anyway," Shaun shrugged, and got up to drop his coffee cup and the remains of his croissant into the bin.  
  
"What? Why?"  
  
"Because this morning you've got a session of hand to hand."  
  
Desmond blinked. "Yeah? Guess I should go find Lucy then."  
  
Shaun smirked at him, like he knew something Desmond didn't.

"Don't bother," he told him. "Because your session is with me."  
  
+++++++++  
  
Desmond thought he should have known. After all, Shaun had said he was an assassin, and for a guy who sat at a computer all day, he looked pretty damn fit. Of course, lying on his back staring at the ceiling for the third time in as many minutes, Desmond figured he could be forgiven for not putting two and two together.  
  
"All right, Desmond?" Shaun asked mildly. They'd been at this twenty minutes now and he'd barely broken a sweat. Desmond, on the other hand, was feeling a little like he'd been put through a wringer a couple of times.  
  
At least the guy wasn't being a smug prick about it. Actually, he was surprisingly professional, cool even, speaking seldom, just expecting Desmond to learn from doing, carefully pushing to see what Desmond knew and not doing Desmond the courtesy of pulling any of his damn punches. Desmond half expected him to start breaking out with the Lawrence Fishburn any minute, but he just stood calmly and waited while Desmond pushed himself painfully back to his feet.  
  
"Okay," Desmond sighed, rotating the shoulder he'd just landed on. Tendons shifted with a slight pop. "Again."  
  
When Shaun came at him this time, Desmond was more or less ready. The guy was fast, incredibly fast, and he barely telegraphed any of his moves. Desmond was more or less on the defensive here, ducking and dodging and just trying to look for an opening that didn't seem to exist. Shaun's hand came at his head again, and Desmond reacted before he'd even thought about it, throwing himself back before it could connect.  
  
"What are you doing wrong here, Desmond?" Shaun asked him, and Desmond watched him hang back and circle like some kind of predator. He looked different without his glasses on; sharper, more focused, his expression hard and unfriendly. He reminded Desmond of someone, but he was too busy wondering where the next attack was going to come from to bother trying to work out who.  
  
"I keep getting in the way of your fist?" he joked, but Shaun didn't laugh.  
  
"You're heavier than me, not by much, mind, but enough. And yet, you're backing off." The other, snarkier Shaun made a brief appearance in the mean smirk he gave Desmond then. "Afraid you're going to _hurt_ me, Desmond? I'm flattered."  
  
"Jesus, Shaun," Desmond scowled. "There's no need to be a bitch about it."  
  
Shaun's expression went cold and hard again. "Then come at me like you mean it," he spat in what sounded a lot like disgust. "You pansy."  
  
Desmond didn't know what happened then. One minute he was out of Shaun's range, the next he was practically on top of him, not thinking about where he was putting his feet or the subtle shift in Shaun's body as he scored another hit. He took it with a grunt, brushed it aside, knocking Shaun's guard out and smacking him hard on the shoulder while hooking a leg around the back of his knee and dropping him hard into the mats. He followed him down, intent on finishing it, raised his fucking fist to do so like he still had a god damned blade attached to his wrist but when he looked down, Shaun was staring up at him not in alarm at the signature move but with a mad grin on his face.  
  
"Thought that'd get to you," he grunted, grabbing for Desmond's arm, fingers clamping around his wrist even while he was twisting his legs underneath and Desmond knew with a flash of foreknowledge that he was about to throw him. "You _liked_ what Antonio did to you, didn't you?"  
  
Desmond froze, the shock of hearing it froze him, guilt and shame and the want that he'd been trying to ignore that had been eating away at him since last night suddenly backdrafting into his brain, and then he was flying, flipping through the air and landing hard, breath knocked from his lungs and Shaun on top of him, pinning him down and panting, staring down into his face.  
  
"Quit being an emo wanker and _admit it_!" he all but snarled and Desmond practically couldn’t think he was so fucking _mad_.  
  
"Fine! All right!" he roared, trying to buck Shaun off. "I fucking _liked_ it! Are you happy now, you fucking ass-"  
  
Desmond's head went blank, rage stalled, at the feel of Shaun's mouth on his.  
  
It wasn't a kiss, it was another assault, and everything Desmond had been feeling, everything he'd been fighting for the last twelve hours, the confusion and the need and the anger and everything, just burst, violent and mean. He opened his mouth and strained up, pushing back, challenging this bastard who thought he knew every fucking thing about it, biting, panting into it. Shaun's tongue was in his mouth, licking like he owned it, and Desmond didn't know when Shaun had let him go, but his hands were on Desmond's face, holding him to the angle he wanted him, and Desmond's arms were around his shoulders and he couldn't get his breath, ached between his legs, and he wanted, God, he wanted to just roll over and…  
  
"Desmond. _Christ_ …"  
  
Desmond gasped and wrenched his head back, dropping it back to the mat and turning it away and squeezing his eyes shut. It felt like maybe he was having that panic attack now.  
  
"Get the fuck off me," he grated, his voice too high and shaking.  
  
"Desmond…"  
  
"Now."  
  
Shaun hesitated a moment longer, and then did, quietly. Desmond stayed where he was, sprawled on the mats, eyes shut tight, him and his hard on and this foreign need all churned up and choking him, until long after Shaun had collected up his stuff and without another word left the room.  
  
+++++++  
  
"Desmond! What the hell?!"  
  
Desmond surfaced, fourth time that session, blinking back to his own reality only to have Rebecca's cranky face come into focus.  
  
"What is _up_ with you, man? That's the third time in, like, an hour."  
  
"Look, I need a _break_ , okay!" Desmond snapped, and Rebecca blinked and jerked back like he'd slapped her, but he really didn't give a shit if he hurt her feelings or whatever. The Animus knew; it knew he didn't want to be in there right now. Synchronicity was down something like twenty five percent from two days ago. Desmond was struggling just to stay with it today, and he had seriously had enough. He tore the connection off his arm and threw himself up off the couch to his feet. "I need some time alone. Or out fucking side. We've been at this for a week now and this shit isn't easy and I'm sorry but it's a lot for me to deal with."  
  
"Desmond…" Lucy started, getting up from her desk but for once Desmond didn't want to hear what she had to say. He raised a hand in her direction and she stopped like he'd struck her mute.  
  
"I'm just," he grated, then forced himself to take a deep breath and let it out, forced himself to remember this wasn't their fault; none of it was their fault. "I'm just going topside for a while," he finished flatly, and walked out before anyone had a chance to say anything else.  
  
Desmond went down to the warehouse floor, walked over to one of the stock racks and climbed up. A little while back, he'd noticed a loose rivet near the corner above. It wasn't difficult to swing off one of the girders hard enough to kick the sheet it was securing loose, then all he had to do was bend it back and he was outside, standing on the warehouse roof, staring around like he couldn't work out why there wasn't a mess of terraces and tiles and alleys and towers spread out in front of him. But of course, that wasn't where he was. He didn't know where he was, but he was somewhere where there were more warehouses on a vast plot of dead, flat land, beyond which lay a wide, dirty river skirting an unfamiliar line of skyscrapers.  
  
They'd kill him for this, probably. It was a stupid risk he was taking, since Abstergo could be anywhere, have eyes anywhere, but he just didn't give a shit right now, not enough to go back inside. He trudged over to the other side of the roof to the cluster of vents and conditioning outlets and hunked down under the overhang of one of the maintenance hutches, and screw it if the Templars had satellites out that could look under awnings or spot his body temperature through exhaust heat. He didn't care. It was good to be outside – amazing, in fact. It was quiet, cool with the breeze coming off the river, and somewhere behind him the sun was setting, throwing everything into burning relief. He felt like the only man on earth, and with all that had been going on the last couple of days, it was comforting. He wondered why he hadn't tried this before, but maybe he just hadn't been pissed enough. He wasn't sure he was all that pissed now, of course. More… frustrated, angry at himself. Hurt.  
  
He breathed in - natural, clean air, what a luxury – and let it all out again on one long sigh, closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall behind him. He just needed some space, a little time. He knew he was running but he figured he had a right. It was hard enough sometimes just remembering what was real and what wasn't, let alone sort his feelings from Ezio's or work out what it was he really wanted. For a second, he almost wished he was back in Abstergo. Their treatment of him might have sucked, and there was that whole Subject 16 thing, but at least Altair had been relatively uncomplicated, simple. One thing at a time, no room for anything else, and maybe he'd been shying away from that messy knot of emotions that always seemed to bubble to the surface whenever he hit Jerusalem, but he'd been straight and sure like an arrow, like a hawk on the dive.  
  
Ezio on the other hand was like an explosion, like a whirlwind; all grand emotions and very little shame, like someone stuck permanently in their teens. Stupid passionate Italians.  
  
Desmond sighed. He ought to just suck it up, he supposed. This shit had gone on long enough and it was time to admit it. He'd liked it. Not Ezio, that was kind of a given, but Desmond; Desmond himself had liked it. Shaun had been right.  
  
So he was gay, or bi, or he didn't mind cock, or something. There was no use throwing a fit about it if he couldn't change it. It was just taking a little adjustment – like realising he knew how to kill people in fifteen different ways with a butter knife had taken adjustment. The Animus was changing him. It was unavoidable. He just hadn't thought it would change him like this. He wasn't sure he wanted it to, but it was too late now…  
  
He must have dozed off, because he blinked and abruptly became aware of two things – one, it wasn't light out any longer and two, he wasn't alone anymore.  
  
"You going to come down for dinner any time soon," Shaun asked quietly and Desmond glanced over at his shadow standing next to one of the vent stacks and relaxed. "Or are you still not done sulking?"  
  
"How did you get up here?" Desmond demanded instead, wearily.  
  
"So, still sulking then," Shaun guessed and walked over and sat down next to him, not too close but not really all that far away either. "I got up here the same way you did, Desmond. I would have thought that would be obvious, after yesterday."  
  
Desmond frowned. It had to be said, didn't it. He knew it did. He just didn't really want to. "Yeah, about yesterday…"  
  
"No," Shaun interrupted, but politely, like he was talking to a stranger suddenly. "Let me. I'm sorry. I got, well, I got carried away. It shouldn't have happened. It won't happen again."  
  
Desmond turned to stare at him, but Shaun's face was turned away, his profile a faint outline against the dark.  
  
"I took advantage of the information I had. I pushed you. I knew exactly what I was doing and I –"  
  
"Why?" Desmond interrupted, and Shaun flinched a little and glanced round at him like he was surprised.  
  
"Why?"  
  
"Yeah," Desmond said, and suddenly he was angry all over again and he didn't even know why. "I mean, did it give you some kind of satisfaction or something, to force that out of me? Was it a _lesson_? Assassins have to be ice, they can't let anything in, they can't want other –"  
  
"Desmond, no! Of course not!"  
  
But now the words were coming out, Desmond couldn't seem to stop them. "Because, you know, the day before yesterday, I was straight, as far as I knew, and now I want shit I've never wanted before, and if you were just fucking messing with me to –"  
  
"Oh, for fuck's sake!" Shaun snapped, and then suddenly he was on Desmond again, and Desmond had a second, a mad, stupid second where he thought, _oh, thank Christ_ , and then they were kissing again.  
  
It wasn't the fight it had been before, because this time the difference was Desmond knew he wanted it. He'd been afraid of it then, and now he was just afraid that Shaun was messing with him. But if he was, he was a colder bastard than even he tried to make out, because he was kissing Desmond deeply, almost gently and his hands were moving slow on Desmond, cupping the back of his head and the side of his throat, thumbs dragging firmly, lingeringly back and forth. He wasn't faking it, couldn't be, and Desmond didn't think, he just opened up, dragged him closer, and Shaun muffled a needy sound into his mouth and kissed him some more, with lots of tongue, lots of _skillful_ tongue.  
  
Desmond was panting, felt dazed and stupid when Shaun drew back, had no idea what he was supposed to do or say at this point but Shaun smelled familiar, and really good. When the hell had he started noticing that? His skin was warm and his glasses looked askew in the faint light and his thumbs were still drifting back and forth across Desmond's skin and it was okay with Desmond, one hundred percent okay if that didn't stop.  
  
"I was not messing with you," Shaun said, and if his voice hadn't seemed to have dropped into the rough lower register of his range he might have managed to sound annoyed. "I was messing up, alright? You never _react_. I can throw everything I have at you, I can be as mean as I want, and I get nothing. It makes me want to see you bite back. It's been driving me crazy the way you just accept it all. Like none of it's touching you. And then I got what I wanted and…fuck, Desmond, you're smart enough. Please don't tell me you don't _get_ it by now?"  
  
"Oh," Desmond said, and maybe he was starting to get it. "Seriously? That's… that's a little messed up, Shaun."  
  
"Well, if you hadn't taken a roll in the hay with that slime bucket Antonio…" The 'then none of this would have happened' part of the sentence was pretty much clear, and Desmond found himself snorting out a little laugh.  
  
"Not hay," he confessed. "Bent over his fucking desk in the drawing room."  
  
"Jesus," Shaun breathed, but he didn't sound horrified. Kind of the opposite, actually.  
  
"Shaun," Desmond started, his voice gone small trying to swallow past the sudden tightness in his throat. "I think I really want…"  
  
" _Jesus_ ," Shaun said again, more harshly, but all Desmond could feel was grateful for not having to actually _say_ it. "I really thought you'd have more of a freak out about this," he told him, and pushed Desmond onto his back.  
  
Oh, Desmond was having a freak out alright, but it was secondary to Shaun's weight on him and the slow deep kisses he was giving him and the way their bodies sort of locked together and how weirdly good it felt, even the part where Shaun's pretty obvious hard on was rubbing slowly against Desmond's pretty obvious hard on.  
  
"So did I," Desmond said, trying to kiss back except Shaun was moving, working his way down, kissing, biting, shoving clothing aside and God, God, he was a pretty attractive guy, wasn't he. Desmond had noticed; yeah, he had. He'd liked bugging him just to let him tear strips off, because he was smart and pretty damn funny and he gave a shit under all that and now, now there was this other part of him as well. Now Desmond knew he could probably kick just about anybody's ass, and that he felt great lying on top of him and that he definitely knew how to do things with his mouth other than bitch, and…  
  
"Oh," Desmond gasped as one of Shaun's hands jerked his jeans open and pushed them and his boxers down and then wrapped around him, shockingly intimate. "Oh," he said again when Shaun's head lowered and his mouth went around him. "Oh, _my god_." God, that felt, that felt incredible, Shaun's mouth was incredible, hot and wet and _sucking_. He scrabbled at Shaun's shoulders, tried to spread his legs but didn't get very far with his jeans half way down his thighs and Shaun's weight pinning them, and then Shaun went down, _right down_ , and Desmond could only lie there, staring dazedly up at the cobweb dusted overhang above, and listen to the filthy sounds Shaun was making underneath Desmond's gasping for breath as he just tried to hang on.  
  
And then he felt pressure at his asshole, one of Shaun's fingers, maybe two, slick with spit and pushing into him, and he wanted that, that and more, and it didn't even hurt, he was too far gone for it to hurt. He was babbling, he could hear himself - _Shaun. Shaun, fuck_ , and _Please, fuck, please_ , and then Shaun sucked hard, pushed hard, his fingers curling, hitting something Desmond already knew was there but it was like a button being pushed, like an override switch and Desmond was no longer in control. His hips jerked of their own accord and he gave a shout and then he was coming and it whited out everything in his head, everything, leaving only Shaun, Shaun swallowing, his breath gusting raggedly against Desmond's skin; Shaun, his fingers thrusting into Desmond gentler now as Desmond shuddered through the last of his orgasm and then fell back, dazed and exhausted.  
  
"Holy shit," he panted, blinking, pawing blindly at Shaun until he could find a bit he recognised and pull him up and kiss him clumsily, and there was a new taste sensation, but fuck it, Desmond would learn to live with it. "Holy shit, Shaun."  
  
Shaun laughed a little, breathlessly, and gave in to Desmond's insistence that he let his weight down on him.  
  
"Well," he said a little primly, but he sounded pleased, really pleased. "Glad you liked it."  
  
"Liked it?" Desmond repeated, a little incredulously. "When can we do it _again_?"  
  
That got a proper laugh, short and sharp like Desmond had surprised it out of him. "Well, as soon as I recover and we get some privacy and I explain to you a few of the not terribly pleasant but entirely important things that your ancestor possibly neglected to share."  
  
Desmond blinked. "Oh, you…"  
  
"Yes," Shaun supplied, and Desmond could practically hear his eyes rolling. "Came in my pants like a bloody teenager, so yes, feel free to be smug about it, you –" He leaned down and kissed Desmond again. " – bastard, God, the way you _sounded_ – " He kissed him again. " – how you feel under me, and – " And then they were suddenly at it again, wrapped in each other's arms with no space between them and Shaun's mouth tasting weird and musky and Desmond's jeans still around his thighs and this, this was the best thing to have happened to Desmond in a really, really long time.  
  
"Okay. Okay, stop," Shaun panted. "Christ, what have I done? I've created a monster."  
  
Desmond laughed, and let him go, and wriggled himself back into his jeans and did them up while Shaun sat next to him, staring down at the mess he'd made of himself and shaking his head.  
  
"I'm insane," he muttered. "We’re both insane."  
  
Desmond didn't feel insane; in fact, this was the sanest he'd felt in a while. "In comparison to what, Shaun?"  
  
"That's a good sodding point, and I reserve the right to resent it," Shaun grumbled. "How the hell am I going to get back downstairs past Bec and Lucy looking like this?"  
  
Desmond got himself to his feet, bracing himself just in case, but all things considered, he felt pretty steady, felt okay; more than okay, actually. He reached down and gave Shaun a hand up, then clapped him on the shoulder, deliberately matey, and grinned.  
  
"Well, you're an assassin," he told him cheerfully. "I'm sure you can work something out."  
  
And then he was off, still grinning, and somewhere behind him, he knew Shaun was glaring.  
  
"Very funny, Desmond!" he shouted after him. "Fuck you very much!"  
  
Desmond just laughed. "Only if you can catch me, Shaun."  
  
But to be really honest, Desmond didn't intend on trying that hard to get away. He was done with running for now.


	2. Slight Miscalculation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shaun has made some grand mistakes in his time.

Shaun Hastings has made a big mistake. On the scale of big mistakes, in fact, this one is colossal. It's almost off the bleeding scale. He knows this because of the following:

  1. He's not sleeping right;
  2. He's not eating, and when he does, he's eating shite (clearly, because Rebecca gives him That Look when she sees what he is eating. He manfully and not a little resentfully ignores her);
  3. He's running on caffeine. He determines this based on a top typing speed of about 120 words per minute and a weird tunnel vision effect not unlike an acid flashback, and the number of times Lucy's said 'Shaun!' in exactly that particular tone of voice (a grand total of fourteen);
  4. He hasn't actually looked directly at Desmond Miles in exactly three and a half days. And six hours. And eleven minutes. Not that he's counting.



So. Big mistake. His concentration is shot, his mood is foul, and the only reason it isn’t a complete balls up is that he hasn’t made any mistakes that have gotten anyone killed. Yet. But Bec's been snapping at him – a clear sign he's getting a bit too much even for her – and, well, Lucy; Lucy took him aside yesterday and gave him The Talk. You know, that guff where she tells him that they're the ones that everyone else is relying on, and how they can't fall apart, how they have to keep it together because the second the enemy smells weakness they're dead, many Bothan spies died to bring us this information, yada, yada, yada.  
  
He just rolled his eyes and found an excuse to get out of the conversation as fast as humanly possible. After all, it's not like she has to tell _him_. He's the one who spent years - many of them fragile formative years, thanks - watching Abstergo work, watching them literally chew people up and spit them out. No one believed him, of course, but that didn't stop an unmarked S.W.A.T team blowing up his Hammersmith apartment and trying to kill him. And yes, in that order. So, no, he's pretty sure he knows exactly what they're capable of and he really doesn't need the 'we need to stay focused' speech.  
  
The really annoying thing about it though is that it actually does seem to help for a while, but not for the reasons Lucy thinks. He gets his head back in the game, manages to stop thinking about what happened for more than ten minutes at a time, and then, just when he’s figuring it must have just been a phase or an infection or something, he happens to look up over dinner and Desmond Miles smiles at him across the table. It’s sort of a strange combination of shy and suggestive, and Shaun suddenly and abruptly forgets what he's going on about. For several long seconds, he just stares while his heart does this odd flop in his chest like a fish suddenly floundering out of water.  
  
Panic promptly sets in then and he opens his mouth to start back-peddling fast. Every single reason why he should be leaving Desmond alone, why the other night up on the roof crossed every single boundary of ethics and professionalism Shaun knows and therefore should _never ever happen again_ flashes through his head and maybe he can disappear before Lucy tears him a new one and Bec stops talking to him altogether and-  
  
And then he realises that neither of them even saw it. Lucy's up and turned away at the sink, cleaning off her plate, and Rebecca's at the table with her nose planted in a book, and both of them are only pretending to pay attention to him. But not Desmond. Desmond is definitely paying attention, and he's smiling, and the only person who's seeing that smile of Desmond's – who hardly ever really smiles at anything – is him. Which, Shaun's got to surmise, means that that smile isn't _for_ anyone else; it's just for Shaun. And just like that, Shaun's right back where he started: not sleeping enough, not eating right, running on double espressos and getting crabbier and crabbier by the hour.  
  
Or, for the dimwits in the audience: royally screwed.  
  
And he has only one person to blame. He'd like to say that person is Desmond, for being so… Well, it's not Desmond; it's him. Because he should have known better. He did know better, and for some reason he can't even begin to fathom, he didn't care. He'd like to say it was because neither Lucy nor Bec really had any idea of how to handle Desmond in mid-meltdown. Sure, Lucy's probably seen it before working at Abstergo, and she was a mess – and absolute bloody mess when Subject 16 finally killed himself – but sometimes it's time for caring sentiments and open communication, and sometimes the situation calls for a less subtle hand; a bloke's touch, so to speak.  
  
Of course, upon closer examination, that reasoning doesn't really hold up too well, mostly because the amount of bonding time Shaun's actually spent with Desmond approaches zero. He refuses to count that night last week where Desmond hadn't been able to sleep and Shaun had still been up working. Sure, ragging on Desmond's choice of movie and having to listen to his actually pretty amusing running commentary had been the closest thing to fun Shaun's had in a while, but he’s not sure it counts. And if Desmond deliberately chose something he knew would make Shaun bitch and moan and then acted like annoying Shaun was more entertaining than the film, that's beside the point, because it's clearly not Desmond with the problem here.  
  
Not Desmond with the problem at all. Want to talk about inappropriate workplace behaviour? Shaun's blown right past that, hooked a right at sexual harassment and screeched to a halt alongside predation and emotional blackmail, so trying to play the good guy in this instance isn’t really cutting it. He didn't go after Desmond the other night because he gave a toss about his psychological well being. Well, okay; alright, he'd been a little concerned about his psychological well being. After all, realising you liked men at this stage in your life would be difficult for anyone, let alone a kid-next-door kind of guy like Desmond. Realising you liked them because your ancestor didn't mind a bit of cock from time to time and a black market piece of technology that wasn't supposed to exist had _reprogrammed_ you to, had to be near terrifying. But mostly, it just pissed Shaun off, watching Desmond pretend to be okay about it when he clearly wasn't. Of course, in retrospect, Shaun should have had enough presence of mind to realise he was a little too pissed for a hand to hand combat session before he started it, but by the time he'd realised – after he'd pinned Desmond down and shoved his tongue down his throat – it was demonstrably too late.  
  
And then he'd compounded the problem by following Desmond up onto the roof - a big mistake. Macking on another guy during a little friendly tousle is one thing; it can be overlooked. Desmond could have just acted like it never happened and Shaun could have put it down to not having gotten any in a while and that would have been that, things back to normal, everything peechy. But a blow job is a little harder to pass off and now he supposes he's paying the piper, considering he can't seem to concentrate and he's found one daft reason after another to go over to the other side of the room and steal surreptitious glances at Desmond while he lies in the chair, plugged into the Animus.  
  
It'd be almost funny, if he understood what the bleeding hell he was doing. It's not like he hasn't been with blokes before. In fact, for a good quick shag he usually prefers them to women. But Desmond isn't really his type. Sure, he's... good looking. He's got a great body and he even actually has a brain, although he clearly doesn't choose to _use_ it all that often. And since he won't seem to leave Shaun alone when he's not in the Animus or asleep or working out, Shaun has even learned to appreciate his dry sense of humour and the fact that he won't rise to the bait nine times out of ten - and Shaun's broken better men in less time than it's taken to even put a slight dent in Desmond's armour.  
  
Still, none of that is cause to find himself staring at the server bank in front of him, unseeing, thinking about how Desmond sounded when Shaun had sucked him off, how his trembling legs and his hoarse voice and his hands scrabbling blindly for some kind of contact had been so much of a turn on Shaun had come in his pants, rubbing himself off without even undoing his fly. Worse still, even really good sex doesn't explain why he can't stop staring at Desmond's mouth even when he's not speaking, why he knows where he is in the room even when he's got his back to him, and it definitely doesn't explain why, when Desmond smiles at him across a dinner table, Shaun's heart does a good impression of keeling over on the bloody spot.  
  
So, he has made an unbelievably big mistake, and it has to stop. It's ridiculous; intolerable. It can't go on. But that's Shaun's other problem, because he doesn’t know what to do about it. A little distance from the situation is out of the question, and he's not sure he can talk to Desmond. What would he say? _Sorry mate, you were great but it's a bad idea to get involved. So, how about a goodbye Princeton then?_ It's like trying to break up with someone he's not even seeing. Compared to the few times in his life he actually was in a serious relationship, this can't be that hard. All he has to do is go back to his desk and stay there and convince himself that Desmond Miles is just something else he's done that he probably shouldn't have.  
  
And he's trying to. He really is. He's even closing the server door. And then Desmond blows it again.  
  
"Hgnnn," he groans, and it sounds like he's in pain or… something and Shaun will just wait, because, well, maybe that glitch in the database backup is going to show itself again.  
  
"He's coming up," Rebecca says unnecessarily and out of the corner of his eye Shaun can see Desmond raise a hand and paw at his face like his motor skills are a little off. "That's the longest he's ever been under. Luce, you don't think he's pushing himself too hard?"  
  
Lucy gets up from her desk, graceful as always, and shakes her head as she pads around to Desmond's side.  
  
"It can't be helped," she sighs, and gently pulls Desmond's raised hand down away from his face. "Desmond? Desmond, come on back. You're okay. Come on."  
  
Desmond grunts and then blinks his eyes open. He doesn't quite look like he's completely back yet. He stares up at Lucy blankly for a second, and then blinks again and pulls his arm out of her hold.  
  
"'m good," he rasps. "'m fine."  
  
But he looks like shite and Shaun feels a spike of something – anger or maybe even fear, he's not sure – and has to check the urge to stalk over there and shove Lucy out of the way.  
  
"Can you get up?" she's asking and Desmond nods after a moment and then sits up slowly, carefully, swings his legs over the side of the chair and breathing heavy like it's an effort. Then he pushes himself to his feet.  
  
And promptly almost collapses again.  
  
"Woah," he breathes, as Lucy grabs for him and struggles with his weight while Desmond looks around like he doesn’t know where all his motor control just went or why.  
  
"Shaun!" Lucy gasps, but Shaun's already there, grabbing Desmond, his arms going around his body to hold him up.  
  
"Desmond?" Lucy says again when Shaun's got a hold of him.  
  
Desmond shakes his head at her, almost angrily. "Fine. Told you I was fine." But he's clinging to Shaun and he's shaking and it's pretty obvious he's not.  
  
"That's it," Shaun grates, gritting his teeth and scowling in Lucy's direction. Christ on a bike, she should know better than this. "He needs to unplug."  
  
"No," Desmond protests faintly. "Shaun, 'm okay."  
  
"Shut it," Shaun snaps, and then cuts a look at Lucy. "You know he does, Lucy."  
  
Lucy stares back. For a minute she looks like she's going to argue and that thing they never talk about, that no one ever talks about – Subject 16 and what happened to him – is right there in the room with them. Shaun stares; he has no compunction whatsoever about playing that card if she makes him.  
  
"Alright," she relents finally. "Yes, you're right. I'm sorry. Desmond, go with Shaun, alright? Get some rest. I'll...come check on you later."  
  
Not if Shaun has anything to do with it, she won't, but he nods at her anyway and then hefts Desmond a little more securely against him and, ignoring his vague protests, walks him out to the lifts.  
  
"c'n walk, y'know," Desmond mumbles, his arms hooked around Shaun's neck as Shaun cranes to push the call button.  
  
"You can't even talk, mate," he snorts, the sound over-ridden by the lift doors sliding open. They shuffle into the lift and the doors close again, and Shaun pushes the button for the sixth floor and then stands there leaning back against the lift wall, trying not to think about how good Desmond feels against him right now, how well he fits. He's not thinking about it because, he reminds himself, he can't keep doing this. It's unprofessional and unethical. Desmond is no more gay than Shaun is a descendant of Christopher Columbus and it's only a matter of time before he works that out. Then, when he realises that Shaun took complete and utter advantage of him, he won't smile at Shaun across tables anymore. The best Shaun can hope for in fact is that Desmond will punch him out, but considering the amount of time he's been spending in the Animus, more likely he'll kill him with a pair of safety scissors.  
  
Not that he could even lift them right now.  
  
"Where we goin'?"  
  
He’s practically unconscious in Shaun’s arms, sounds tired and vulnerable and Shaun has to clench his hand against the small of his back and force himself not to pet the guy's head like a pet pooch or something.  
  
"Room up on six," he tells him. "It's where I sleep. You've been here all this time, and you've never wondered about where we all go of an evening?"  
  
"None o' my business," Desmond mumbles. "Figured you holed up somewhere; you're assassins."  
  
The acknowledgement – not that Shaun needed it in the first place, you realise – makes something glow low and warm in his chest. Or maybe that's just heartburn from breakfast.  
  
"Nice of you to notice," he returns gently as the lift grinds to a halt and the doors slide open. "Too much activity going in and out of what's supposed to look like a warehouse and even those morons working for Abstergo would start to catch on. So, we converted a few of the empty rooms into living quarters. Lucy and Bec are over on five on the west and south sides and this is me." They shuffle out of the lift.  
  
"Cool," Desmond slurs, lifting his head to glance around a little. It's a pretty big space and there's not a computer in sight, mostly because that's the way Shaun prefers it. These days work is enough of a life to make him want a little something away from it, and what his room lacks in technology it makes up in good old traditional media – mostly books. Shaun likes to read, pretty much anything he can get his hands on, although he draws a line at that hack Dan Brown. It's all second hand, recovered from dumpsters, occasionally lifted from a Borders store because he has to keep his skills up somehow. No point in having anything new; it's not really a good idea to get too attached to things when they can be blown to kingdom come at any given moment, as Shaun has already learned. But it's as comfortable as he can make it, his clothes and shoes on racks, a basin and mirror in a little alcove left of the lift exit and a loo and shower around the other side of the wall. In the far left corner there's a set of bookshelves and a small mountain of beanbags and a reading lamp which he will in fact be loathe to part with if it ever comes down to it. And in the other corner against the far wall under a well covered window there's a ridiculously comfortable king size bed with clean sheets and the best pillows a little Amazon hacking can buy.  
  
"Come on," Shaun says, leading Desmond over to said bed and lowering him down onto it, and it's testimony to how crap Desmond must feel because he doesn’t complain this time, just eases back with a quiet sigh, his eyes closed. Shaun straightens and glances around to check everything is still in place, but only because he tends to a little paranoia, not because he actually expects company hit men to be hiding behind his Norman Mailer.  
  
"Right," he says. "Now try to pay attention long enough for me to explain a couple of things. There's two alternative points of egress. The skylight over there and the window here, both rigged to pop out on impact. Outside there's a fire escape landing with a collapsible ladder to the warehouse roof. From there you turn north east. There's access back into the warehouse floor on that side, or if you have to, egress to the ground."  
  
"Got it," Desmond says slowly and carefully, without opening his eyes, like a man who's had too much to drink and is trying to fake sobriety. "Skylight, south corner. Window, north east to ground. Weapons?"  
  
Shaun hmphs, wants to say 'show off' but doesn't, because actually he's kind of pleased to find Desmond is finally thinking like an Assassin.  
  
"There's a Glock between the wall and the bed at about shoulder height, and another over behind the beanbags. They get cleaned and practice fired regularly. If it comes to close quarters fighting, there's also a short blade between the mattress and the base at the head end of the bed in the middle. You can feel the handle if you run your hand along the seam."  
  
"Good," Desmond says, and Shaun suddenly feels less like he’s paranoid and more like he just passed some sort of test, which is a little offensive really but he supposes he can let it slide.  
  
"So," he starts, "now we have the getting to know you part of things out of the way..." He lowers himself down to the edge of the bed next to Desmond and leans over and starts unzipping his hoodie.  
  
Desmond's eyes crack open to look at him. "I can do that too, y'know," he points out, and Shaun frowns and keeps working, moving to his sneakers and pulling open the laces and tugging them off, followed by his socks.  
  
"So, sit up then," Shaun challenges, and Desmond looks at him for a moment longer and then gets his arms under him and pushes himself slowly up. It looks like it takes him a lot but Shaun doesn't call him on it, just keeps working. He reaches over and tugs the jacket over Desmond’s shoulders and down his arms, and Desmond is about as limp as rag doll while Shaun pops the jacket cuffs over his hands and then tosses the garment over the end of the bed. When he turns back, Desmond is trying without much success to twist himself out of his tee shirt. It's kind of cute, the way he's struggling, like a little kid too tired and uncoordinated to do anything himself.  
  
"Here," Shaun sighs impatiently, and Desmond goes back to pliant obedience as Shaun drags the offending shirt off over his head and tosses it over the end of the bed as well. When he looks back this time, Desmond is still sitting up, watching him. His face is drawn and his eyes are a bit dull, but there's clearly something going on in that head of his that Shaun probably doesn't want to know about.  
  
"Pants," Shaun instructs, and gives Desmond a gentle push back.  
  
"Shaun," Desmond starts to object, resting on his elbows to look at him. "I really don't think you want to..."  
  
"Desmond," Shaun says impatiently.  
  
Desmond looks at him a little longer. "Fine," he sighs.  
  
Shaun only gets to the second fly button when he stops.  
  
Desmond sighs again. "I was trying to tell you," he complains and when Shaun glances up at him there's a faint touch of colour in his cheeks and his eyes are a little downcast, not quite looking at Shaun, and Jesus, that's just...  
  
"Oh, please," Shaun blusters. "What are you? A thirteen year old girl? I've seen it before, Desmond." That said, he pops the rest of the buttons, studiously pretending he can't feel the faint, wiry brush of Desmond's pubes against the backs of his fingers or the heat coming off his skin, because he kind of just wants to lean down and…  
  
None of that. Breaking up, remember?  
  
"Yeah, about that," Desmond starts but there'll be none of that either, Shaun tells himself.  
  
"Lift up," he interrupts, and grips Desmond's jeans by the waistband. Desmond hitches his hips up a bit so Shaun can pull the jeans down and off.  
  
"Shaun…" Desmond tries again, and he doesn't sound happy about sounding like he's trying to talk about something, which is fine, because Shaun doesn't want to listen to it.  
  
"You look buggered," he says, rising with the jeans in his hand, and walks around to the end of the bed to bend down and pick up the rest of his clothes.  
  
"Shaun," Desmond repeats, his voice harsh, enough to make Shaun glance back before he can think better of it, and fuck, mistake number three - or is that twenty-three? - because Desmond is lying there _naked on Shaun's bed_ , propped up on his elbows, glaring at Shaun, and his hair is messed up and his legs are spread a bit like he doesn't even realise and he looks like the best porn Shaun has ever seen.  
  
Suddenly Shaun's brain isn't working again. At all. He knows he's staring – god, how can he not – and of course suddenly he's thinking about all the things he's been trying not to think about for the last four days. Like how Desmond's skin felt, and how he sounded – Christ, Shaun's always had a thing for vocal partners and that was such a turn on, the way Desmond had begged like he didn't care who heard him, like he didn't even know what shame was. Suddenly Shaun is thinking about all those things and more, like about how much he wants to –  
  
"Get some sleep," Shaun tells him, cutting the thought off savagely and turning away to take a breath so he can keep going. "I'll be back with some food later."  
  
"Shit," Desmond says softly, and then, "Okay. Fine."  
  
He doesn't sound happy about it.  
  
Shaun flees. He is completely man enough to admit it, but it's only when he's back in the elevator, his heart pounding and his face flushed warm and his dick half hard, that he realises he still has Desmond's clothes in his hands.  
  
He absolutely does not bury his nose in them and breathe in on the way down to the laundry; he doesn't want to add _creepy stalker_ to that whole predation and blackmail thing.  
  
+++++++++  
  
Desmond must have gone out like a light after Shaun left because when Shaun comes back to his room five and a half hours later, Desmond is sound asleep. He's also sprawled face down across Shaun's bed. The pillows have been shoved to one side and his face is turned away, one arm hanging over the side of the bed. Shaun takes two steps out of the lift and stumbles to a dead stop, staring open mouthed in surprise, because he'd known Desmond was pretty good looking but like this he's _beautiful_. In the fading light coming through the skylight his skin looks smooth and supple and Shaun can see the subtle definition of the muscles across the line of his shoulders tapering down in a graceful curve to the small of his back. And then Shaun's staring at the curve of his naked arse and his thighs and the shadows between them and in his own head he's already over there smoothing his hand over all that flesh and pressing a kiss against one of the dimples above Desmond’s tailbone and sliding his fingers -  
  
"Bloody hell," he chokes under his breath and the shocky sound of his own voice is enough to reassert a little reason into his thinking long enough for him to drag his eyes away. There aren't even words for what he wants to do Desmond right in this second and this is pretty much the hardest break-up he's ever gone through. He forces himself to remember all the reasons why anything else would be a bad idea; reminds himself all the way over to the other side of the room, in fact, where he drops Desmond's clean clothes folded in a neat pile at the end of the bed, and then bends down and places the tray with Desmond's dinner on it on the floor.  
  
"Shaun?"  
  
His heart hiccups a little and then settles back into its regular rhythm as Desmond breathes in audibly and shifts on the bed.  
  
"Sorry. Didn't mean to wake you," he says a little hoarsely.  
  
"You didn't," Desmond says, his voice low and sleep rough and so dead bloody sexy it's almost a crime. "How long have I been out?"  
  
"Almost six hours."  
  
"Shit. Guess I needed it."  
  
Shaun breathes in. The increased oxygen to his brain doesn't really seem to help. "Well, you could probably do with a few more, so just get some food into you and then get back to sleep, while I go keep Lucy at bay for a bit longer."  
  
He stands and goes to do exactly that, but suddenly Desmond's hand is around his wrist and that makes him look, against his better judgement. Desmond hasn't moved, except to bury his face back into the mattress. He's making noises that sort of sound like words although Shaun can't really be sure.  
  
"Desmond, are you talking to me or the bed linen?”  
  
"I said," Desmond repeats, coming up for air and frowning faintly like there's something he just doesn't get. "Why are you being so nice to me right now, when lately you won't even speak to me?"  
  
"Well, I'm speaking now. Or are we engaging in some strange Colonial custom I've yet to be introduced to?"  
  
Desmond puts on a full blown scowl at that. "Yeah," he agrees gruffly. "It's called manning up. You should try it some time." And then his expression changes again, his eyes searching Shaun’s. "Did I… I mean, did I do something wrong? It's not like I've… ever done it before, so if I did…"  
  
And Shaun would love to pretend he doesn't know what Desmond is talking about, but he does, because he hasn't been able to think about anything else since it happened and Desmond's right; it probably is time to man up.  
  
"Oh, sod it," he sighs, because he's trapped in more ways than one, Desmond anchoring him by the wrist and the twinge of his conscience making it known in no uncertain terms that he definitely cannot let a question like that go unanswered. "No. You definitely didn't do anything wrong. It was me. I should never have…"  
  
Desmond jerks his wrist, sharply, to get his attention. "What?" he says softly. "You're going to tell me that it shouldn't have happened? When it felt that good?"  
  
"I took advantage of you!" Shaun points out harshly, glowering down at him, and how can he not get it? "You had no idea! You were confused and vulnerable and I –"  
  
Suddenly Desmond pulls on his wrist again, a lot harder this time, and not expecting it, Shaun pitches over, hits the bed half sprawled across Desmond and then suddenly he's on his back with Desmond on top of him and here it comes, he's going to break Shaun's nose, or maybe his jaw and –  
  
"Fucking hell!" Desmond explodes, and for the moment he seems not to notice that he's stark naked and straddling Shaun's hips, and frankly neither does Shaun, because Desmond at the end of his tether is actually a little bit scary. "Who the fuck do you think you are?! You think I didn't know exactly what I was doing, Shaun? You think I didn't really want – You know what? Fuck it." And he jerks Shaun up by his shirtfront and leans down and kisses him. Hard.  
  
And Shaun lies there, taking it, not moving, not kissing back, his hands in the air because he can't very well put them on Desmond, on his warm naked skin because he doesn't want… he _can’t_ want….  
  
Oh, sod it. Who is he kidding?  
  
Desmond makes a sound in the back of his throat when Shaun grabs his head and holds him still so he can kiss him properly, so he can push his mouth open and lick into him and bite gently at his bottom lip and then go back to kissing him some more and it's every bit as good as he remembers. Desmond groans and goes heavy on top of him, and he feels so good, too good. Shaun is done for, seriously. He's not some bleeding machine, and Desmond is warm and soft with sleep and smells a little musky and his breath is panting raggedly against Shaun's skin when Shaun moves to bite lightly at his ear, to kiss the hollow behind it, to suck at a spot on his throat where the tendon stands out a little. He's shifting on top of Shaun, a sinuous undulation that follows the path of Shaun’s hands and Shaun can feel the press of his cock, hard and hot, against his hip. His mouth is chasing Shaun’s with breathless, slightly clumsy kisses that don’t always hit their mark and it’s making Shaun absolutely crazy with want.  
  
"Shaun," Desmond gasps, and his hands are everywhere they can reach, in Shaun's hair, pushing his glasses off and dropping them somewhere off the bed, touching, pulling at Shaun's clothing and getting nowhere in his haste. "Shaun, you gotta…"  
  
"What?" Shaun takes a breath and forces himself to focus, to slow down, because if he's making another Big Mistake, he's bloody well going to do it right. "Desmond?"  
  
Desmond takes a breath as well, and stops whatever it is he's trying to do – ostensibly, getting Shaun naked – and looks down on him. His face is flushed and his expression is so open that it's almost painful to see.  
  
"You gotta believe me; you never took advantage,” he swears. “I wanted it. I'm always somebody else. I'm always what I can do for everybody else. The war, the Animus, Abstergo, my parents. Even Lucy. I mean, I get it. It's important. I can't run away from it anymore, but you…"  
  
Okay, and it almost looks like he going to cry. Shaun knows how to handle a lot of things, but not even he knows how to handle that.  
  
"Shh," he says. "Hey. Des. Come on."  
  
"You like _me_ ," Desmond finishes, and then takes another shaking breath and frowns. "Right?"  
  
Shaun knows in that moment what it probably feels like to have someone reach into his chest and grip his heart in their fist, and he knows too - really knows, and maybe he always did and was just being a tosser about it - that he is never breaking up with Desmond Miles ever again. Fucking _death_ is going to have to separate them.  
  
"Jesus," he breathes, and wraps his arms around Desmond and just hugs him, presses a kiss against the side of his head. "No. Bloody hell, whatever gave you that idea?"  
  
Desmond hears it for the joke that it is and relaxes in his arms, bowing his head against Shaun’s shoulder.  
  
"I don't know," he laughs shakily, his fingers curling unconsciously into Shaun's clothes, his voice muffled. "Guess I thought it meant you did, since you're always pulling my pigtails and calling me names, you prick."  
  
There’s no heat in the insult and Shaun laughs and shifts his grip to grab Desmond's amazing, bare arse and rock their hips together again. The pressure and friction against his hard-on is exactly perfect.  
  
"I am at that," he agrees and Desmond gasps and huffs out a laugh and props himself up again, and that is so much better. His smiling face, the light coming into his eyes, makes Shaun feel like he could take on the entire Templar order single bloody handed.  
  
"Oh, yeah," Desmond agrees, but it's pretty obvious he's not talking about Shaun's many personality flaws exactly. "Lucky thing, I know how to handle pricks." He blushes a little and then looks cross when Shaun completely fails to not laugh. "Shaun, this might seem a little obvious, but I want to be absolutely clear here. I really, really want to do it. Like, right now."  
  
"It. It..." Shaun starts teasingly, but there's the hard press of Desmond's cock against his hip and Desmond's warning glare and not even Shaun can't be that much of a bastard. "You're sure?"  
  
"You want me to say it?" Desmond demands, and that mixture of defiance and vulnerability in his expression is so familiar it's not funny. "Fine. I want to fuck. More specifically, Shaun you're-a-supreme-prick Hastings, I want _you_ to fuck _me_. Up the ass. Is that good enough or would you like me to go into more detail?"  
  
Possibly that feeling Shaun is experiencing in his chest is a heart attack. Bloody hell, Desmond should come with a health warning.  
  
"I think- I think I can take care of the detail."  
  
"You can be as much of an asshole as you want later," Desmond assures, and leans down and kisses him, then kisses him again, and starts moving again slowly, thrusting, and he's probably staining Shaun's trousers with pre-come, but Shaun really cannot bring himself to care.  
  
"I can?" Shaun says dryly, but entirely without rancour. "How magnanimous of you. Come on, admit it. You like it when I'm a tosser," he accuses, but really, right now Desmond could call him anything he wants. Shaun's way too invested in encouraging every move Desmond chooses to make at this point, craning up to nuzzle against his neck and press his mouth against Desmond's thudding pulse as they grind together.  
  
"Okay, yeah I do. A little," Desmond confesses breathlessly. "So, uh, how do we do this?"  
  
Shaun grins against Desmond's skin. "You don't want to snog for a bit more?"  
  
"Snog?" Desmond repeats on a snort. "What the hell kind of word is that? God, your hands feel amazing."  
  
"Pash," Shaun provides, and keeps his hands kneading, gripping, squeezing, sliding, moving, since Desmond seems to whole heartedly approve. "French kiss. Fool around. Feel up. Mack on."  
  
"Ohhhh…" Desmond says, but that likely has more to do with how Shaun's hands are now sliding along the creases between the backs of Desmond's thighs and his arse and gently tugging his cheeks apart. "Uhn," he gasps, and shivers a little on top of Shaun. "No. No, that we can do anytime. You people have some seriously weird sayings, you know that?"  
  
"You don't know the half of it, mate, but far be it from me to argue," Shaun agrees, grinning and kissing Desmond again. "Well to start with, you'll have to let me up so I can get some condoms and the lube."  
  
"Oh, okay," Desmond blinks, and then rolls off him and flops onto his back and Shaun absolutely cannot stop himself from following, leaning over him to kiss him again, running his hands all over that smooth, taut flesh, across his chest, his abs, down to his belly, thumbing the groove made by the muscles of his groin and sliding lower.  
  
Desmond’s grip around his wrist puts a stop to that.  
  
“I thought you were getting rubbers and shit?" he reminds, and his cheeks are a little red again, his eyes a little glazed. Shaun smirks. He could get addicted to that faint blush of arousal and embarrassment on Desmond's face.  
  
"I got distracted," he says unapologetically. "No idea how that happened."  
  
Desmond's embarrassment subsides into a smile then, and it has no less an effect on Shaun than the smile he gave him nearly a day ago across the dinner table.  
  
"Right. Condoms," Shaun reminds himself, and climbs off the bed and crosses over to the basket he keeps on the rack with his clothes to dig around in it for a couple of condoms and his lube. Truth be told, he doesn't use this stuff a lot these days - life of a secret operative not all it's cracked up to be and all that - but if Desmond keeps being… well, Desmond, he suspects he'll be using it a hell of a lot more. And boy he's going to have fun explaining that one on the shopping lists.  
  
Still, that's a problem for another day. Right now, there are no problems. None whatsoever. He comes back to the bedside, puts the lube and condoms down and starts quickly and efficiently stripping, watching Desmond watch him, his eyes shadowed, intent. And interested, really interested.  
  
He grabs up the supplies and crawls back onto the bed, and Desmond is sitting up to meet him and then they're kissing again and seriously, Shaun could do this all night.  
  
"Mph," Desmond starts and Shaun removes his tongue so he can speak. "So, um, now what?"  
  
Shaun smiles, runs his hand idly up and down Desmond's bare thigh and watches him shiver and stare back, not scared, just a little unsure, expectant, trusting. Sure, that trust probably has a lot to do with the fact that Desmond can in fact kill him with his own bedclothes, but it doesn't change the fact that for Desmond, this is a new experience. He may have relived some of his ancestor's memories in the Animus, but out here, he's basically still a virgin, and, okay, Shaun hadn't actually needed that idea in his head on top of everything else. He's going to have to not think about things like that or this is going to be over before it's even started.  
  
"Well, now you roll over," he says, but Desmond frowns and doesn't move.  
  
"Can't we, uh, do it this way?" he asks in a hesitant voice, his gaze suddenly downcast.  
  
Shaun blinks. "You want to?"  
  
"Yeah," Desmond breathes, and that blush is creeping down his throat now. "Ezio… I mean, Antonio…"  
  
"Hmm," Shaun intones, but it’s easy to see what Desmond’s thinking, that he doesn’t want it to be like that, he wants to be something else, a different memory, something that belongs only to him. Shaun is happy to provide that something; more than happy. “Okay.”  
  
Desmond's eyes slide up to his face, like he expected Shaun’s answer to be a no.  
  
"Yeah?” And then he hesitates. “What's the matter?"  
  
Shaun takes a steadying breath. It doesn't really help. Jesus, Desmond gets a lot, but he doesn’t get everything. He definitely doesn’t get this, what he does to Shaun, what he’s doing to him.  
  
"You really have no idea, do you?" he says and Desmond frowns a little again.  
  
"Hey, look, didn't I say you could be an asshole later? Just because I've never -"  
  
" _No_ ," Shaun mutters, and leans down to kiss him again, his tongue pushing, sliding. He wraps his hand around Desmond's cock and strokes, his grip tight, demanding, and Desmond throws his arms around Shaun's neck and wrenches his head back to gasp for breath while Shaun loses a little more of that tenuous grip he seems to have on his sanity, because he's saying, "God, you should see you, hear you. You… You're so fucking… " Gorgeous, so incredibly fuckable, so beautiful. “ _Amazing_.”  
  
Shaun can't stand it anymore. He pulls out of the hook of Desmond's arms, bends down, slides his hand down to the base of Desmond's cock and puts his mouth around the rest.  
  
"God!" Desmond gasps.  
  
Shaun sucks another oath from him a second after that, and then Desmond is scrabbling at his shoulders, pushing at him, frantic, panting above him and Shaun could just keep going until-  
  
"Shit! Stop! Shaun! Shit! I don't- I want to-"  
  
Shaun drags himself off him with what amounts to monumental effort, presses his fingers firm around the base of Desmond's slick cock and looks up to see Desmond with his arm thrown across his face, his skin flushed hot underneath it.  
  
"Christ," he pants. "Jesus Christ. I really think you're going to have to hurry."  
  
"Alright," Shaun pants back, beyond convinced. “Lift your legs.”  
  
Desmond lowers his arm and looks at him and then lifts his legs and hooks them carefully over Shaun’s shoulders. Shaun smiles reassuringly.  
  
“If you tell me to relax, or whatever,” Desmond tells him, looking a little annoyed, “I may punch you.”  
  
Shaun arches an eyebrow and reaches for a condom, tears the packet open and rolls it down onto his cock and then reaches for the lube.  
  
“I’m not going to tell you to relax,” he says. “You already know what to do.”  
  
Desmond doesn’t speak while Shaun slicks his fingers up and carefully but not exactly slowly spreads the slick around his anus and then pushes in with one digit, watching Desmond’s face as he slides it back out then in again, repeating the process.  
  
“I don’t –" Desmond starts, his voice low and a little unsteady. “Okay, I do, but he just… “ He pauses for a breath as Shaun pushes a second finger in, spreading more lube around and stretching him steadily. “He just got me – Ezio – drunk and went for it. Not, like, oh, God. Not like this.”  
  
Shaun bends down and presses a kiss against the inside of Desmond’s thigh, bites at the muscle gently. His erection’s flagged a little, but that’s just the conflicting stimulus, and Shaun’s deliberately avoiding his prostate until he can get three fingers in there easily and Desmond’s giving him the right signals.  
  
“Knew there was a reason I hated the wanker,” he murmurs, sliding his fingers out and adding a third before getting back to it.  
  
“Jesus,” Desmond huffs, probably from the additional pressure but he’s also smiling. “Shaun, you can’t be jealous of someone who doesn’t exist anymore.”  
  
“I’m not jealous,” Shaun argues calmly. “I’m just saying, if he was still alive, I’d probably have to kill him.”  
  
“I’m going to kill _you_ ,” Desmond corrects, glaring down at him, “if you don’t stop talking and _fuck me_.”  
  
“You know,” Shaun says thoughtfully, “I’m pretty sure you’re the one who needs to stop talking.” He crooks his fingers and presses them in and his aim, despite how long it’s been since he’s done this, is fairly accurate. Desmond gasps in a harsh breath, jerks his hips up and throws his head back, his eyes screwed shut, and that’s more like it, Shaun thinks; a lot more like it. He slides the fingers out and then presses in again, dead on target and this time he holds them there and rubs.  
  
Desmond moans, loud and raw and needy and, Christ, Shaun has never wanted anything as much as he wants Desmond to keep making those sounds.  
  
“Fuck!” Desmond pants when Shaun finally lets up and slides his fingers out, fixing him with a glare that’s one part pissed and two parts hungry. “Bastard. God damn.”  
  
“Still want to kill me?” Shaun smirks.  
  
“You’ve got five seconds,” Desmond threatens, sounding wrecked. “After that I can’t promise – Hey!” he gasps as Shaun kneels up, gives him a good tug down the bed and leans in, bringing Desmond’s legs with him until Desmond’s shoulders are taking most of his weight and Shaun is pressing the head of his cock against Desmond’s arsehole.  
  
Desmond’s mouth works silently for a moment as Shaun pushes in, his eyes on Shaun’s face and his skin flushing pink from his ears right down to his collarbone.  
  
“Jesus H Christ…” he manages in a strangled voice.  
  
Shaun agrees, or would if his entire being wasn’t now focused on where his cock is breaching Desmond’s body, is sliding home until he’s fitting snug inside him. He’d make a joke, or tell Desmond that’s not his name, but it’s all he can do to just breathe, let alone form words.  
  
“’s that feel?” he manages. Desmond’s hands are gripping his arms hard enough to bruise, as cliché as it sounds, his whole body trembling with tension.  
  
“Good, I think,” he groans shakily, like he almost can’t believe it. “Real good. Fuck, I think I really like this.”  
  
Bloody hell. And just like that, Shaun’s about a twitch away from coming. He bows his head and screws his eyes shut and just breathes and desperately tries to mentally recite the order and year of the Roman Emperors from Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus to – Okay, so he can only manage to the first ruler of the Flavian dynasty. It’s enough, barely.  
  
“Shaun,” Desmond breathes, and Shaun opens his eyes and looks down at him and he’s smiling again and Shaun wouldn’t have credited it, but his heart gives another little flop.  
  
“Come on, Shaun,” he says softly, and there’s no challenge in his tone at all, just welcome, warmth, desire. “You can move, man. I’m not going to break.”  
  
“Sorry to say, but it’s not you I’m worried about breaking,” Shaun grits back, and Desmond grins at that. Shaun, never someone to let anyone have the last word on anything, slides himself out a little, almost experimentally, and then back in again and –  
  
And now he’s started he doesn't want to stop, _can’t_ stop, and the smile is gone from Desmond’s face. Instead he’s panting as Shaun thrusts again, and then again, and again, his mouth hanging open and his eyes dark and hot and glazed over in lust. He looks so good, feels so good, Shaun just has to lean down and kiss him again, even if it’s murder on his lower back, even if he has to practically fold Desmond in half to do it. Desmond moans, loud, clutching at him and kissing back and breathing raggedly into his mouth, gasping out, “Christ. _Christ. Shaun_ ,” and trying to drag him closer.  
  
No one in the known world would accuse Shaun Hastings of being a pushover. No, generally he’s a somewhat self-serving, moderately arrogant, bitchy little tosser. But he’s also human, very, very human, and that does him in, Desmond is doing him in; Desmond liking it, _needing_ it. Not even sodding Superman could last with Desmond underneath him like this, and Shaun is definitely no Superman. He’s not going to last another three strokes, can feel it already, a delicious pressure in his balls and the base of his spine and the pit of his stomach. He pulls back out of the kiss, straightens, grips Desmond at the curve of his sweaty waist where it meets his hip, hopes to God the leverage will be enough and he won't lose the rhythm they have going, and reaches with the other hand for Desmond's cock.  
  
On the first firm stroke down Desmond shakes, literally shakes all over, and then he's arching into Shaun's fist, scrabbling at the bedding over his head for enough purchase to counterthrust himself onto Shaun's cock, harder, deeper and Shaun obliges, blindly, swearing heartfelt curses. Then Desmond shudders again and with a hoarse oath he's coming, ejaculate striping his stomach and chest and Shaun's hand in hot splashes, his muscles convulsing around Shaun and that is it, that is all Shaun can stand. He is gone, lost; blazing, blinding, merciless sensation bursting open and flooding through him, overriding everything, all sense, all control, all awareness as he grinds into Desmond and tries to remember how to breathe.  
  
It's the position that brings him back a few long blank, wrung out moments later, leaning over Desmond buried in him to the base. Desmond is breathing raggedly underneath him and shivering like his system has overloaded on sensation. Shaun's back is starting to protest and every nerve in his body feels a little like it was just fed through an AC power supply. He takes a hold of the base of the condom with a slightly shaking hand and draws himself carefully out. Desmond doesn't move, except to groan and then drop his legs and lie sprawled across the bed covered in his own come, and Shaun stares at him as he pinches the rubber off and ties it up, debating to himself the merits of just leaving him like that until he can recover enough to do it all over again, because he's finding the picture inspiring to a degree that is in no way fair and deserves _some_ kind of retaliation.  
  
"You moving any time soon?" he asks, and Desmond cracks what seems to be a baleful eye open and stares at him.  
  
"Nope," he says, and he sounds even more wrecked than he did before.  
  
"Right," Shaun sighs and drags himself off the bed and over to the sink, dumping the condom in the trash and returning with a warm, damp wash cloth, and Desmond still doesn't move, so Shaun just sighs and cleans him off carefully and slowly, listening to Desmond hum low and content in the back of his throat before tossing the cloth back at the sink and collapsing face down on the bed next to him in an ungainly heap.  
  
"Shaun?" says Desmond eventually.  
  
Shaun makes a noise that could, under certain conditions, be construed as inquisitive.  
  
"My ass kind of hurts," he complains, and, "That was awesome."  
  
It takes a moment to sort through this enough to realise the two statements aren't actually supposed to relate, no matter how it sounds.  
  
"Glad t' hear it," he mumbles. "Sleep. Aspirin. Good as new. Maybe do it again."  
  
"Yeah," Desmond agrees, and rolls over and throws an arm and a leg over Shaun and snuggles down with a sigh against his shoulder.  
  
Shaun lies there for a bit.  
  
"Desmond?"  
  
"Mmph?"  
  
"What are you doing?"  
  
"Cuddling. And going back to sleep."  
  
"Oh," Shaun says.  
  
"Alright with you?"  
  
Shaun thinks about that. "…Yes," he says eventually, and actually, it's very alright; alright enough that after a moment he pushes himself over onto his side and then his back, an awkward shuffle that seems to effect Desmond hardly at all except to lift himself up long enough to get Shaun's arm under him so he can just go back to burrowing in against Shaun's side. Of course, Shaun's arm just naturally curves around him, his hand splayed across warm, soft skin, stroking idly, and maybe they'll end up spooning, Shaun thinks, and he likes that idea, lying here curled around Desmond or Desmond curled around him. He does in fact, like everything about this, and he likes that he fully intends to do it again as soon as he can.  
  
And as he's falling asleep, it occurs to him that he's probably made a big, big mistake. He's just spent the last three and a half days, eleven hours and – well, he's just spent all this time trying to stay away from Desmond, trying to maintain a professional distance, trying not to let himself want all the things he wants when he looks at Desmond and trying to pretend he doesn't want what Desmond wants when Desmond looks at him, and what he realises is that he should never have bothered in the first place. He knows this because:

  1. He doesn't want to move, ever. He really is actually content - happy even - right where he is;
  2. But if he has to move, he only wants to move far enough to be able to touch, bite, kiss, lick, taste, fuck, suck – skin, lips, cock, mouth, wherever he can reach, whatever he's allowed;
  3. He's high on endorphins and possibly something a little more permanent than brain chemicals that's making itself known somewhere south of his head but north of his dick;
  4. He will literally kill anyone - Abstergo operatives, Lucy, the bloody cleaner, it doesn't matter - who tries to come into this room and take Desmond away from him in the next two hours. No, make that days. Actually, more like ever.



Or for the slow kids in the audience: he's well and truly and marvellously screwed and he fully intends to stay that way.  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I just discovered adding a chapter and trying to put it before the chapter that's already there somehow deletes the existing chapter. Apologies for any confusion or broken bookmarks!


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